Rude Boy USA (28 page)

Brenda continued to visit Ben behind Jose’s back. All they did was have sex, and he would pay her from his wallet. Ben would also pay her in weed. The visits became frequent,
and Ben became concerned that Brenda was developing feelings for him. Brenda had become so comfortable that she would walk around the place naked to entice him, and it would usually work. She would make herself available when he made batches of heroin in the kitchen. She made sure that she asked how he created his batches and how the game worked. Ben was high much of the time and did not think to keep some things to himself.

Brenda was there to fish for information, so she could get herself into the drug game. She knew Jose’s schedule, and when he was on his way home, she would dress and tell Jose that Ben was looking after her, and he would believe it. Jose was street smart, but when it came to relationships and women, he was gullible. Brenda would also have sex with him. Ben saw the triangle as a distraction from everything else. It was risky but worth it. Sometimes he would feel sorry about it, but the sex was too good, and she had a way of getting into his head.

Ben knew it was time for him to move on with his life. He returned to the streets to continue his hustle. Sales of heroin in the South Bronx were higher than ever, and he wanted to take advantage of the boom while he could. While he was out, a commotion between two rival gangs, the Dark Hearts and the Seven Immortals, was taking place within one of the neighborhood parks. The small fight turned into a melee when other members from both gangs joined, and a few members of a third group arrived. The fight began when one gang member demanded the
jacket of the rival gang member, and he refused to give it up. If you walked into rival communities, the unwritten rule was that you were to remove and hand over your colors to the rival gang. If you did not, it was considered the ultimate disrespect to their community, and you were asking for a war.

Word of the melee spread quickly in the area, and kids, residents, and members of the gangs involved, as well as other rivals, assembled at the park to watch the commotion. Members of the Ghetto Brothers arrived to see what was going on and to put an end to the fighting. Jose stepped up in between two of the fighting gang members to ask for peace. The members of the groups involved told him to eat shit and began to attack him. Soon after, one of the gang members picked up a pipe and started swinging. Soon after, all the groups in attendance were fighting each other. They were beating each other to a pulp with bats, sticks, chains, and whatever object they had on their person.

Ben heard about the situation and ran from his post. He joined in the melee, beating and hitting rival gang members with his fists and objects from the ground. He was desperately trying to defend his group. Someone began beating Jose to the point where he became unconscious. After Jose was down, they continued to kick him. Authorities soon arrived after one of the residents called the police. They were ready to arrest the participants for unlawful assembly. Gang members scattered while those injured remained on the ground. Their brothers were assisting them until ambulances arrived.
Other members started throwing rocks and other objects at the police officers.

An hour after Jose arrived at the hospital, he passed away from injuries he sustained during the beating. This angered Ben, and he went out immediately to seek revenge. He left the hospital and began walking home. Since Ben had already had a taste of what it was like to take a life, his conscience no longer processed the consequences of his actions. He did not care anymore. When he passed the block where the fight occurred, it had already returned to normal, as if nothing had ever happened. Little girls were back outside playing double Dutch, older men sat at makeshift tables playing dominoes, and kids were throwing a football.

Ben spotted a member of the Seven Immortals walking down the street. He knew that the man had been one of the gang members in the melee. Ben yelled at him, saying that he was walking into the wrong territory. The man stopped, turned around, and told him, “Shut the fuck up, white boy! I’ll fuck you up too.”

Enraged, Ben reached into one of the pockets of his jacket and pulled out a gun. This was his James Bond moment; he thought to himself. He could hear the theme music playing in his head. He began to march to the gang member, who started to run up the center of the street. Ben yelled back, “I’m gonna give you hell, baby!” and chased him. He started shooting at the guy as they both ran down the middle of the block. The girls who were skipping rope stopped, the men stopped their game of dominoes, and the kids stopped throwing their football
back and forth to watch what was going on. None of them ran. Everyone paused to see what the outcome of the street shooting would be.

Ben used all of his bullets but did not hit the man once because he managed to run off. He succeeded in hitting cars, the sides of buildings, and a storefront window, and he narrowly missing one of the children in the street. That kid ran home to tell his parents what had just happened. After the shooting was over, everyone in the neighborhood turned around and resumed their activities, as if this had been just another episode of a show. Ben headed toward his apartment.

Word on the street of Jose’s death and the shooting afterward spread quickly. Members of the Ghetto Brothers wanted to put an end to the fighting. They were all mourning Jose’s sudden death. Instead of continuing the cycle of attacks and retaliation, they decided to call a truce. Not all of the members were on board, but enough of them agreed to participate. Jose’s death affected many people throughout the community because heads of rival gangs had respected him. Some of the lower members did not share the same regard for the Ghetto Brothers or Jose, but the leaders knew what he was about and appreciated him because he represented peace.

Ben sat on his dirty couch and stared at the wall. The apartment was quiet, and he knew it would remain that way
because Jose was not coming back. Some parts of the wall and carpet were pristine white; other parts of it had faded to a light-brown eggshell color due to time and dirt. The white parts were the areas he had scrubbed with bleach to get Jerome’s blood spatter off the walls. For the first time in a while, he sat there and did not pick up a needle to mask his emotions. He wept without the help of narcotics. Instead, he wondered what had become of his life and how he had ended up here. He felt like the failure that he had accused John of being. Ben continued to cry until he fell asleep.

Bangs on the door suddenly woke him up. Ben asked who was there as he picked up his pistol. “Police!” the voices shouted, and they knocked down the door. Ben had nowhere to go. The only ways out of the basement were the front and back doors, and police had both surrounded. The cops told him to drop the weapon. Ben complied and put his hands up. He begged the police officer to shoot him. The police rushed over to him, knocked him down to the floor, and cuffed his hands behind his back. The detective announced that he was under arrest for some charges, which included possession of an illegal weapon, destruction of property, assault with a deadly weapon, and the robbery of money from Edina’s apartment.

The parents of the child who ran home after the street shooting had called the authorities and that kid had led them right to Ben. People knew that Ben and Jose were roommates. After the police had read Ben his rights, they proceeded to take Ben to the county lockup. Brenda was on her
way to the apartment to see him after leaving the hospital. She walked up as they were taking him away. She began to scream at the police. “Where are you taking him? Put him back, you fuckin pigs! That’s my baby’s father!” she said.

“Be quiet before we take you in,” the officer said to her. Ben looked over at her as they were pushing him toward the vehicle.

They pushed Ben’s head into the police car and shoved the rest of him onto the back seat. He and Brenda looked at each other through the window as the police drove away with him. She attempted to go into the apartment, but the police would not let her in, as they were conducting an investigation. On the way to the holding facility, Ben knew what was ahead for him, and he did not care anymore. He just wanted to get away from life. He knew he would fail every ballistics test they took; however; he would not confess to anything—not to taking Edina’s money, not to drugs, not even to Jerome’s murder—unless they could prove 100 percent that he was responsible. He knew how the system worked.

After he had arrived at the precinct, they photographed and fingerprinted him. Central booking staff interviewed him for more information. They asked him why he had Jerome’s personal belongings in his possession. He refused to expound. They then escorted him to the court building and spoke to the assistant district attorney, who told them that this case was going to the courts and filed a formal complaint against him in criminal court on the behalf of the
people of the state of New York. He was arraigned before a judge and appointed counsel. They informed him that they were charging him with assault, robbery, drug possession, drug distribution, and illegal use of a weapon. More charges were possible pending the results of an investigation. He pleaded guilty. He knew that if he went to trial, it would guarantee that he would be put away for life. The judge decided to hold Ben without bail, as he was a flight risk. The judge ordered him confined in custody pending a grand jury action.

Ben was taken back to holding, stripped of his clothing, and given prison garb and a roll of tissue. Because of overcrowding due to a large number of arrests in the city, and because he was not likely to receive bail, they transferred him from the precinct holding cell to the central jail until his next court hearing.

Investigators continued to look around the apartment after police took Ben away. One of the detectives noticed what looked like dried blood on the couch and a few spots left on the carpet and the walls. Ben must have missed them while cleaning up the scene. They sorted through the other piles of miscellaneous items strewn about the apartment and found various drug paraphernalia, suitcases of cash (mostly hundred-dollar bills in stacks), and Jerome’s wallet, wedding ring, and chain in a purple Crown Royal bag. The box of baby clothes that Jerome had brought into the apartment with him lay closed in the same spot next to the couch. The police were aware that all of these items were missing. They
had a forensics crew come in and take samples of the spots to see if they were indeed blood splatter. They wanted to check and see if this was Edina’s blood.

Twelve hours after placement in the tank, Ben began to have withdrawals from the heroin. He began to sweat profusely and to experience stomach cramps and muscle aches. He asked the deputies for help. They ignored him. After a couple of hours, they gave him a garbage bag and told him to vomit in it. The cops said that the drugs needed to leave his system. The officers would take him to the hospital if his symptoms became worse. They had seen many like him go through there before, and they thought he was a little dramatic. They handed Ben a cup of water and suggested that he sit in the corner and wait it out. This was different from when he had overdosed in Vietnam. There, they had been more willing to treat him. The local law enforcement did not care.

Brenda returned to her family’s place. She was worried. Ben was in jail, and it did not look like he would be getting out anytime soon. She was pregnant. She was almost sure it was Ben’s child. She was not planning to terminate the pregnancy. Having a white baby was seen as a novelty in that area. She and Ben had never used protection, and Jose always used rubbers, sometimes more than one at the same time because he did not trust her. During her visits to the apartment,
Brenda had discovered cash hidden in furniture and holes that they had cut in the walls and the couch. When Jose and Ben were not looking, she would take a stack. She figured that they would not miss it. Over time, she had stolen eleven stacks, which totaled about eight thousand dollars. She hid the money in a hole that she cut in her mattress so her brothers and sisters would not find it. Brenda planned to use it to take care of herself and her baby. She had started spending some of the money before she learned of her condition. Until she could find some financial support for herself, she decided to go to Jose’s family and friends and pass the baby off as his until Ben got out of jail, if he got out. She knew that the Ghetto Brothers would make sure that she was taken care of in the meantime.